Substitute Sunday

You can tell it's summertime and vacation time. This morning, the resident priests and the organist/choirmaster were all on vacation, so we had a substitute priest and a substitute organist.

Since I went to the nine o'clock this morning, I guess the organist had just arrived, so she and the cantoress were going over some of the service music, and, surprisingly, playing some of it on the organ. It's always interesting to hear the Gloria as the prelude! Once they'd looked at the service music, the organist did some "filler" type prelude music, and it was quickly apparent to me that she was not Catholic, Episcopalian, or Lutheran. She had a tremolo going (there's no vibrato stop on that particular organ, so she must have been playing with the Vox Humana against some of the foundation stops) and she seemed to be improvising on what I can only surmise was a "gospel" hymn. She was pretty good for a non-Catholic substitute, though, as she played all of the stuff at the right time and didn't screw anything up. She didn't improvise as much in the "dead spaces" as does the usual organist, but in some parishes, it's normal to play only the hymns and the service music and not do filler. She did "fill," though, after the offertory and communion hymns, and once again, I had that "Protestant" impression and I was reminded of some of the small town funeral home organists I've heard.

Hymns today were Ellecombe (I sing the mighty power of God) for the processional, Sharpthorne (What does the Lord require) for the offertory, and Grosser Gott (Holy God we praise thy name) for the recessional. The particularly not-sung-by-the-congregation responsorial communion hymn marching music was "I received the living God and my heart is full of joy." You know, since the cantors/cantoresses end up singing these things by themselves anyway, I don't know why they just don't let them sing a decent song that's actually meant to be a solo. Service music was the usual summer hodge-podge.

There's no choir at the nine, so there weren't any anthems. I noticed they'd slated William Byrd's "Ave Verum" for a communion motet at the eleven.

The visiting priest, Fr. Casey, was very gregarious. He kept things moving, and I liked that. He also chose to deliver his homily from the center of the pace by the first row of pews instead of hiding behind the ambo (lecturn). He preached on the idea of taking time to listen for God in the midst of all our modern, fast-paced lives.

I noticed one interesting thing in the parish newsletter this morning. They are going to start singing the Mass settings in Latin at the 5:30 Sunday afternoon Mass, though they were careful to point out that the Mass itself would still be said in English. That tall, cute seminarian was there again today, too. What a shame that he's off the market!